Global Field Environment: Dynamics of Change.
Before we begin, please allow me to briefly introduce myself. My name is Dr. Katelyn Lehman, and I have spent the majority of my adult life exploring the relationship between intra-individual and global systems change. You could say that it has become a bit of an obsession: the quest to understand fundamental reality and how we find ourselves in the complex predicament we face collectively today.
I’ll save you some time and skip to the conclusion: I don’t have all the answers.
Millions of brilliant people across the globe dedicate themselves to an exploration of what fosters change in our paradoxical world, a world that is seemingly ravished by exploitation, violence, and despair. The more pernicious aspects of human nature have always given me pause, caused me to wonder.
I should clarify that this piece, inasmuch as it is intended to be supportive for those who read it, does not reflect my original ideas. Ideas do not originate in isolation from those that came before, and any ideas contained herein are no exception.
These are simply my thoughts as words strung together like spheres of lapis lazuli passed down for generations to come.
The field of psychology in which I practice has been around for nearly 150 years. Before that came all the varying philosophical traditions throughout time, from East to West and North to South. So it would be quite narcissistic to assert I hold some privileged knowledge that has not already been articulated by far more learned scholars. It troubles me that our culture is so fixated on damning the narcissist these days. But perhaps it’s simply where we are in our larger evolutionary arc, shaming each other rather than looking in the mirror at our own reflection.
In my limited time on this planet, I have, in earnest, dedicated myself to the task of understanding what constitutes the grounds for therapeutic change and how to go about orchestrating it for the betterment of myself and others.
And so it began…
Before I dive into the principles guiding the dynamics of change in the global field environment, I believe it is helpful to describe what change actually is, and what it is not.
Change is a process, not an outcome.
Change is a universal constant, though not universally constant.
Change operates within and beyond space and time.
Change is not only independent of the human experience, but also integrally part of our daily lives. We would not exist without change. While change itself is neutral, we may assign different meanings to change depending on our unique experience of context.
Scholars have described stages of change as they pertain to an individual’s capacity and readiness for behavioral change, cognitive change, and affective change. A transtheoretical model of change can be helpful when guiding interventions with individuals or groups in our larger collective, but the essence of change is deeper than any particular stage model or technique.
Change is.
So what constitutes the groundwork for deep and lasting change in the global field? If change has a spirit, what could it be trying to teach us? How might we align ourselves with change to create a more loving, peaceful, and just society for all.
Both physics and the psychological sciences experimentally and theoretically demonstrate that there is an intelligent organizing principle guiding evolution across scales, from atoms to stars and everything in between. Including the evolution of human civilization and our individual actualization or biopsychosocial development.
Evidence to support intelligent design is abundant, but don’t tell the atheists editing Wikipedia, or they’ll accuse you of being a pseudoscientist.
This concept is not an abstract philosophical notion, but a palpable experience that unfolds through the very essence of our being. It is who we are.
Our role, then, as agents of change in our multi-dimensional world, is to increase our awareness of that which already exists within us. Our job is to allow change to flow through us, and to be transmuted into what is needed in our homes, our communities, and our larger world.
These Universal teachings are as old as Time.
While this may sound somewhat esoteric, there is an increasing consensus across academic literature and within the broader sociocultural milieu emerging. We form a web of intra-related, co-arising and subsiding, fields and forces. From the micro to the macro, it is through our very being that this field of potential manifests in physical form.
But what does that mean for how we show up in the world? How do we cultivate and sustain relationships? How do we engage with the dynamic dance of change across our lifespan?
As I’ve come to understand this process through direct experience, as well as my scholarly and practical pursuits, “it” is more about unlearning our attachments to what we think we know than it is about attaining some higher degree of knowledge.
Wisdom is earned through brimstone.
With that said, I share the following fundamental requisites for deep and lasting change in the global field environment. If we genuinely wish to design a more harmonious planetary, or even inter-planetary, civilization, it is time for humanity to grow up.
These qualities represent the possibility of realization, which may catalyze healing of even our deepest wounds.
Presence
The most central aspect of any change process is an inherently transcendental presence in the present. The place of inner, intuitive, knowing cannot be accessed without presence. This is the source of all true wisdom and genius.
Trust
Trust is perhaps the most controversial element of change in global field dynamics, because it challenges nearly every institution in our culture. Almost all of education, government, business, religion, and even many family lives are based on mistrust.
The basic assumption of trust in one’s organism is fundamental to any deep and meaningful change-process.
If we are to navigate this phase in our collective evolution, we must learn to trust one another again. To see the basic goodness and innocence in our fellow human kin. Yet all too frequently, in the social spheres where we operate, people are quick to indict one another based on speculative and decontextualized assumptions.
Empathy
The simplest description of empathy is the experience of feeling felt. Empathy is not all good, nor is it all bad, but the experience of feeling felt is fundamental to any kind of deeper systemic or personality change. We must begin to recognize that the suffering of people across the globe, in our communities, and in our homes, causes measurable physiological and psychological changes within both individual and collective fields. But there’s one important caveat: so does love.
Love
The essence of that which orchestrates your very existence is love itself. Many philosophers and scientists now recognize that love is the guiding force driving evolution. If we are to survive as a species, we must become the embodiment of love, incarnate.
Now, this does not mean that we passively accept the malignant aspects of our quotidian status quo, on the contrary! We must continuously and relentlessly return to love: guiding us ever-forward on our journey toward salvation.
Love implies holding ourselves and one another with esteem, with understanding, and with forgiveness. It implies a willingness and desire to seek reconciliation and greater understanding of one another.
While presence, trust, empathy, and love do genuinely unlock unseen worlds within ourselves and in our relationships, we must not be naive about the impact of trans-generational trauma, pain, and suffering. People are people.
There is no utopian world. We live in a society where children are shot down in classrooms and zip codes predict life expectancy, at a time when the digital revolution intended to bring us closer together, seems to have revealed an even deeper chasm of misunderstanding. The ancient Greek’s wrote tragedies for a reason, and our generation is no exception.
Both words and actions have the ability to cause harm or healing, depending on how and when they are wielded. This is why they call it “practice"—it implies we aren’t expected to get it right 100% of the time. Conflict will arise, and others will see things from their vanishing point, but being understood is not a requisite for embodying your innate wholeness.
Love one another anyway.
It is no exaggeration to say that the fate of our planet depends largely on our ability to navigate this phase in our collective evolution: together.
